New life is attainable
during our lives on Earth

Speaking of Religion
The Rev. Dr. Tim Griffin

We Christians are observing the Easter season, which we will do until the Sunday of Pentecost, which falls on June 4 this year.
The Easter season is a season in which we celebrate the Christ’s Resurrection and the accompanying promise of New and Abundant Life.
Many of us are inclined to think of this "new and abundant life" in terms of more — more time; more years. The only difference is that the new life is something that we will attain only after this present life.
That is to say, sadly, many of us do not see the promises of Easter as having any relevance for our present life. Sadly, we do not see new life as a promise that affects us right here and right now.
It was a consideration of this sort that led Karl Marx to assert that religion is an opiate for the masses. Religion is an opiate, Marx maintained, because it diverts our attention from this life by promising rewards in an afterlife.
Religion has a stupefying effect on us and particularly on the poverty-stricken masses whose lives are characterized by oppression and misery.
According to Marx, religion was often used, either consciously or unconsciously, by the wealthy to control the masses and keep them in line by teaching them that they should behave themselves and remain subservient to those in power in order that they might receive their reward in heaven.
Of course, Marx’s understanding of religion is a flawed caricature. But as is often the case with a caricature, there is an element of truth in what he says.
As I said above, it is unfortunately the case that for many, religion, and particularly Christianity, is more concerned with the next life than with this life.
Christianity has too often been represented as a matter of going to heaven than in working for God’s kingdom here on Earth.
And when the afterlife becomes our focus and we think of this life only in terms of behaving ourselves so that we may get into heaven rather than working here and now for God’s justice — for God’s Kingdom — then it is possible for religion to be used as a means of social control and manipulation.
Worse yet, I am afraid that many have left Christianity because, like Marx, they believed this misrepresentation of Christianity (and often were taught this misrepresentation by the Church itself!).
So it is important for Christians (and adherents of other traditions as well) to correct this misapprehension and expose it for the lie that it is.
God did not create us and place us here simply to bide our time and to submit to the powerful so that we may gain a spot for ourselves in heaven. God placed us here to live and thrive on this Earth. God placed us here to further God’s Kingdom on Earth as in heaven, to borrow the words of Jesus’ prayer.
The new and abundant life that God promises is not, then, something to be enjoyed only at some distant time in some different place. Rather it is life that we can choose to participate in and partake of right here and right now, by working to establish God’s Kingdom and by claiming our rightful place in it.
Our place is assured not because we are subservient to the wealthy and powerful but because we allow God, who created us and abides in and with us to shine forth in our lives.
When we actively pursue this course, this way of life, then God’s Kingdom and God’s justice will naturally appear here on Earth in and through our lives.
And when we are participating and partaking of God’s life in this way, death is not possible. That is what it means to have new and abundant life.
So what are we waiting for? ••
Father Tim Griffin is priest-in-charge at the St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, at 1946 Welsh Road in Bustleton.